sports radio

*Sorry for the length, I didn't notice until I was finished how long my rant went*

I tune in to sports radio on occasion. It usually happens when a story breaks which I find important or interesting. There are also the times when my Ipod is not playing usually because I am not driving my car (rare) or the radio offers nothing pleasing to my ears (not rare). In these circumstances, I may stop in for a quick listen before moving on. Today, I did just that.

Now I don't want to throw out any names, but the timing of my tuning in could give away the journalist I heard today. But for those who know Philadelphia sports radio, I heard one of the two of the most popular and controversial gentlemen seeing as their programs cross paths for a time. I don't enjoy either of the two for reasons I will keep to myself, and listening in today didn't not help my personal opinions.

Apparently, Phillies pitcher, Roy Oswalt admitted to working heavy machinery during his departure from the team for Mississippi to check in on his community after the heavy storms moved through. He may have also gotten involved in some manual labor, which is never good for people with back problems in their medical history. Anyways, he was recently placed on the DL with back problems after missing a week while tending to his family. But before that news broke out, he admitted baseball was somewhere between points three and four on his priority list. His family occupied the top spot with his community close behind. He confidently stated walking away from baseball would be an easy decision for him should he have to choose.

Given the two pieces of news together, the particular sport's voice decided to get angry at Mr. Oswalt for (essentially) being irresponsible and disrespectful to the Phillies management, team, and fan base. In the gentleman's opinion, Oswalt's leaving was justifiable but he stayed too long, violated his contract, and sent a bad message to fans. In his words, athletes hold special jobs where they are held accountable to fans who pay to see them perform. By messing up his back and claiming the ability to walk away from baseball, Oswalt was not holding up his end of the bargain. Now fans who paid money won't get to see him for at least two weeks. Instead, Oswalt could have gone down to Mississippi, surveyed the damage, and used his millions to pay for the clean-up while he rejoined the team. Getting his hands "dirty" was wrong and irresponsible. He closed his argument by stating how even normal occupations don't let people leave for that long without inquiring some sort of a penalty, especially if they come back worse for the wear.

Simply put, this argument made me mad. First, why do we treat athletes as if they are super-human? And I mean this both in the positive and negative sense. In Oswalt's case, why are we surprised when a husband and father stops entertaining people in order to care for his family? They're human beings not robots. Isn't that what many of us claim is missing in our culture? We want men engaged in their families, just not the ones who happen to be athletes. That makes us suffer. I mean if I don't get my sport's fix, how will I survive?

Second, why do fans act like they own their athletes? Sure they make a lot of money we all wish we could make. And yes, the majority of them spend it like kids at a candy shop. The athletes of the teams I follow do not owe me anything. They don't need to pledge their allegiance to me, win me a championship, or even entertain me. They need to perform to the best of their ability as image bearers of God just like the rest of us.

Third, shouldn't we applaud Oswalt for being willing to sacrifice for the sake of his family? He isn't going to lose millions, but the team is mad and people are questioning his commitment. In essence he will suffer (to an extent) for doing good. 1 Peter talks about this exact issue a lot. Suffering for such causes is praise worthy and honoring to God. Are we willing to do the same especially if our families are suffering?

And my final point, what does our priority list look like? What impressed me even more about Oswalt was the fact that his family was fine. The house had minimal damage, but he stayed behind to help his community. Not only was his family before his profession, but almost everyone else was as well. He talked about visiting neighboring towns to check in on the damage after seeing his town wasn't too heavily damaged. I'm glad he didn't just send money for the mop-up because I think our culture thinks money is always the solution. In times of pain and crisis, financial gifts will be needed and should be joyfully given. But most of the time, those suffering need the physical presence of people who care. They want someone to talk to, hug, cry on, and sit with them. It appears as though Mr. Oswalt did just that.

I don't hate sports. I was bummed when the San Antonio Spurs got beat up by the Memphis Grizzlies. I exuberantly screamed last night when the Detroit Red Wings scored three unanswered goals to stay alive in their series. I am following closely to the NFL labor dispute, because I want to see if Cam Newton is the Panthers answer at quarterback. And I hope Roy Oswalt gets healthy soon because he is fun to watch and an important part to the Phillies hopes of winning. But there is a serious problem; we do worship our teams and athletes as gods. We pledge our undying devotion to them, hand over fork-loads of money, and sacrifice a lot (health and wealth) to see them succeed. And when they "fail us," we get angry with them for not giving us what we want or think we deserve.

For some reason, I feel the stories in the Bible are not as ancient and disconnected as we try to make them.